Cigarettes generally comprise a cut tobacco filler rod having a paper wrapper enclosing the rod and often a tobacco smoke filter at one end. The present invention is concerned, in one aspect, with providing a novel smoking product which is wrapped in a reconstituted tobacco sheet and which has a smoking quality closely approximating that of a cigarette having a conventional paper wrapper.
Cigarettes exhibit a considerable visible sidestream smoke production, that is, when the cigarette is at rest between puffs by the smoker, visible smoke is generated from the continued burning of the cigarette, and such sidestream smoke can be irritating to some non-smokers. Attempts have been made in the past to develop cigarettes which exhibit a decreased visible sidestream smoke production. Such attempts have included incorporation of special additives to cigarette paper and employing cigarette papers with special burn characteristics in a double-wrapping of the tobacco filler rod.
However, such attempts, while successful to some degree in decreasing sidestream smoke production, have not led to a product which has smoking taste characteristics which are acceptable to the smoker. In one preferred embodiment of the invention, as described in detail below, there is provided a cigarette which not only exhibits a significant decrease in sidestream smoke production when compared to conventional cigarettes but also possesses smoking taste characteristics similar to conventional cigarettes.
Cigars normally are formed of a tobacco filler rod of threshed pieces of air-cured tobacco, which also may be partially fermented, or also contain reconstituted leaf tobacco, wrapped in two wrappers, first a binder (inner wrapper) and then an outer wrapper, either in a spiral wind or longitudinal design. Both the binder and the wrapper layers may be natural tobacco or formed of reconstituted leaf tobacco. Some cigars have a mouthpiece or a filter. Cigars have a distinctive smoking taste, quite different from conventional cigarettes.